Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-03-25
THE WOMEN PLEAD.
The Waite Ribbon League Issues al
Address to the danHfac turers and
Sellers OF Liquors.
The Saloon len are Addressed as Brothers
and Persuasive Argument Alone is
Employ ed to Convince.

/ CHICAGO, Ill, March 1.-THE Nation
al Woman's Christian Temperance Union
! issued an address today to the brewers,
di-tillers, rec.idaEs, wholesale dealers
ana saloon keepers. The address is in
accordance with resolution adocsd at
the annual convention held in Miuueap0-
lis last October. The address is in the
form Of plea, and the people TO whom
It is directed are addressed as brothers
The address says: "FrOm the days OF the
crusade in 1874 until this day we have
been n the hsbit of pleading with you
personally, and by letter and address, to
siye Up the business of making and sell
ing Intoxicating liquors as 8 drink, and to
your credit be II said that in the vast ma
iOrity oil, instances you have treated US
not only with pOlltentsS but with kind
ness in our great and successful
campaigns for prohibition, for none of
them have failed since in even Ohio
Though we have had no constitutional
majority, we had over 800, 900 votes for
prohibition to less than 1000 for
license, AMI in Kansas, Iowa, Maine and
Rhode Island we geIned the amendment.
In ali these campaigns we appeal 10 you
TO say if we have ever manifested g spirit
Of b8rsbness; on the contrary, we have
spoken considerably of you as men,
reserving our denunCiations for
the business in which you
ere engaged, for the laws by which q legal
status is accorded to that business, for
the legislatures which enact such laws
and the voters who are the power behind
this throne Of shame.n The address de-
Clares that many OF the men engaged in
the liquor traffic are possessed Of the
most generous attributes, but among
them are found some OF the most uufOr-
tunate victims of drink. The address
then goes on to say: "In almost every
state and territory we have
sent our appeal to the Iegis-
lature for protection from this
curse and though often grievOuslY disap-
pointed, our plea has not been altogether
IN vain. For thirteen years we have pc
titioned Congress and at last have secured
the first temperance legislation known to
is annals. While our pitiful cry to the
voters Cf the nation has been responded
to by local option laws and constitutional
amendments covering nearly half the in
h&bited area of the republic, we nave
never come with the united voices Of the
White Ribbon Women to that small frac-
tion Of men who make and sell
the poisonous drink against which we are
tLhting Drinks that nerve with danger
Gus strength arms already SO much
stronger than our own, and at the same
time 30 steal away the brain that ought
10 guide those manly arms, that they are
no longer WOman's shelter and proteC-
zion, but her worst enemy. We bring
our plea then straight to WOman's direst
calamity and sorrow, and lay at our feet,
by the testimony Of courts and juries, the
TACT that the liquor traffic is the cause
of 80 per cent. OF ell the crime and
80 per cent. of all the pruperism in this
country. We know you say it is a great
industry and pays enormous revenue to
the state; we know also that for every
dollar it puts into the public treasury
two have to be paid out in securing the
trial Of the criminals it Greats and in
maintaining the paupers it produces"
The address then proceeds to discuss the
question as to whether prohibition does
not prohibits land declares that experience
proves it does prohibit in all practical
sense aud this fact is realized
and acknowledged by manufacturers. 1t
quotes trOr3 resolutions passed by the
liquor men in favor of license, and says
the Endorsement of license condemns the
system. The address finally says: eve
have here addressed the manufacturer
and wholesale dealer IS well IS the dis
penser of strong drinks because We think
an undue share of denunCiatiOn has fallen
On the saloon keeper, who is out a cats
paw to rake out Of the fire the
chestnuts of the rich man back
of him. Our observation teaches us that
the stock and fixtures of the saloon
usually belong to brewers, distillers or
wholesale dealers, who set up in bust
ness men ignorant and poor, who sell
what the capitalists furnish; so morally
this rich man is under deeper condemns
ton than his less enlightened rep
resentatiye.